Free Republic

What you may have guessed, Ken Dewey has confirmed. Oct. 1-11 was the coldest Oct. 1-11 period on record for Lincoln, with records going back 123 years to 1887. High temperatures over the weekend were usually the highs Lincoln records for early to mid-December, according to Dewey, professor of applied climate science at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Saturday's high temperature at the Lincoln airport was only 38 degrees. The previous record low maximum for the date was 41, set in 1987. Sunday's high temperature was only 40 degrees. The previous coldest maximum was 47, in 1946. Similar record-low maximums were...

Though frequently quoted, Mark Twain probably didn’t say the coldest winter he ever spent was July in San Francisco. But someone did. No one would mistake Lincoln for San Francisco. It’s not that foggy. But this July is proving to be one of the coolest on record in both Lincoln and Omaha. On average, the temperature reaches 90 degrees or higher at least 15 days in July in Lincoln. So far this July: once. The best chance for 90 this week is Friday. Monday’s high was only 75. Omaha has yet to reach 90 this month. Lincoln set record lows...

The well-shined boots, the perfect marches, the fittest figure. Staff Sgt. Michael F. Johnston is the U.S. Army’s new standard bearer. The Lincoln Pius X High School graduate was recently named 2009 Drill Sergeant of the Year after a week of exhausting competition against six other drill sergeants. “And, of course, I was just ecstatic,” said his mother, Joan Johnston, of Lincoln. Her son has been to Afghanistan twice, but he spent the last year and a half teaching recruits the ups and downs of combat. Sometimes he has to yell, he said in a phone interview from Fort Benning,...

There were lots of plausible presences at the La Vista Embassy Suites to oppose what many see as the worst livestock impacts of the federal government’s National Animal Identification System. The skeptical manager of the Bassett Livestock Auction, the indignant rancher from Valentine, the long-suffering hog producer from Minnesota — all seemed to have an obvious place in June 30 proceedings aimed at overhauling the program’s most objectionable features. Chris Bambery of Lincoln, proud owner of two chickens on Sumner Street and promoter of what he describes as “backyard chicken PowerPoint presentations,” didn’t blend in as easily. But it turns...

In 2007, West Gate Bank paid no premiums to the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. In 2008, the Lincoln bank paid $160,000. This year, with a special emergency assessment, which was finalized on Friday, President Carl Sjulin is estimating West Gate’s premium to be around $530,000. “It’s a burden,” Sjulin said. It’s also bitter medicine for banks that did little or nothing destructive to contribute to the unhealthy state of the nation’s banking industry. “It’s a very difficult pill to swallow for Nebraska bankers,” Sjulin said. “We didn’t have anything to do with it, but we’re paying for it.” That’s a...

In the latest flap over religion in public places, a Lincoln restaurateur and Christian church have decided to pull their Noah's ark booth out of the Lincoln Children's Zoo's annual "Boo at the Zoo" trick-or-treating event. The reason? A new zoo diversity policy forbade Bible verses on the booth's pizza coupons, and the restaurant owner and church leaders did not want to go along with that ruling. The owner of the daVinci's restaurant chain, Kelly Knudson, said he and First Covenant Evangelical Church leaders decided to pull out despite a 15-year history of participating in the event. For all those...

The abrupt retirement last week of a veteran high school history teacher created a firestorm online and stirred debate about academic freedom in today’s classrooms. Nebraskans for Peace issued a statement calling the suddenness of East High teacher Michael Baker’s retirement “troubling,” especially in light of a peace studies course he started teaching this year. The Academic Freedom Coalition of Nebraska discussed Baker’s departure Saturday. David Moshman, the group’s policy coordinator, said the coalition doesn’t know all the facts but is concerned about the process and whether Baker, 58, was terminated because he was a troublemaker or for his teaching...

Today, Catholic priests are in short supply throughout the entire world. However, with the nation’s highest ratio of priests to Catholics, the Diocese of Lincoln has managed to avoid this problem. According to the Official Catholic Directory of 2005, the authoritative guide to the Catholic Church in the U.S., there are 121 active diocesan priests in Lincoln and 89,236 Catholics. Those numbers indicate there is one priest for every 737 Catholics, which is far greater than the total national statistic of one priest for every 4,723 Catholics. The New York Times reported Oct. 7 that in 2003, there was nationally...